Best Practices in Distance Learning: Choices, Challenges, and Creative Moments

Here you see some of our behind-the-scenes planning. We sometimes met face to face, but also used the wiki to plan our session.

Hey Jessi & Christopher: Welcome to our wiki for NDEO session. The layout is pretty plain for now, but I'll add some color and simple graphics later. Blue notes will be stripped from home page final version when we make this public for NDEO. I'll see if someone can take pix at NDEO session hat we can upload to wiki. (Diane/Oct 13)

Session scheduled for 10:00 am Tempe Time 12:00 Minneapolis Time
Christopher and Nate will hook up at 15 minutes prior to session in 7A studio
11:45 Mpls time

Session Overview:

Minnesota has a long history of solid work in dance education including the growing use of distance learning tools such as video conferencing and online exemplars over the past ten years. We are keenly interested in how the technology affects teaching and learning, and in how this influences our work as teachers and teaching artists. Come investigate this topic from the inside experience of an interactive video conference on Harlem Renaissance dances, followed by a facilitated discussion of the pedagogy.

Essential Questions:

What student needs are we trying to meet?
How do we use technology to support teaching and learning in dance?
What are the best practices in interactive dance sessions ?

Session Goals:

We will model and identify best practices in K-16 dance video conferencing including:

Pre-planning
Interaction (student <-> student and students <-> teaching artist)
Co-teaching (classroom/studio teacher <-> teaching artist)
New practices that may surface from the group discussion

Presentation:

Music playing as people come in
10 minutes Welcome and Session Goals ~ Diane
introduce co presenters, go over the essentials questions

Interactive Session Orientation & Explanation of Roles ~ Jessi

15 minutes Interactive Dance Session:
- Christopher at Cowles Center in Minneapolis
- NDEO participants in Tempe, AZ
C & J model start of class they greet each other in roles of artist & teacher & refer to their prior planning session. J may select 12 to participate if group is large.
C: " What do you know about Harlem Ren dances? Give me 1 word or phrase."

Historical context; solo dancing, body moves, African Am influence
Style & cultural
Christopher will Demonstrate dance with music
Big Apple; basic step, swing high-swing low, scarecrow, bees knees, fleas, pecking, strike a pose, slow mo, organ grinder,
Diane give a 3 minute warning

if time permits....
Read a poem 2x; listen 1st time ; move to it 2nd time. Maybe Jessi could read it 2nd time from Tempe side? Another good way to explicitly show co-teaching.
J & C discuss follow-up for student activities or discussion such as

15 minutes Descriptive Review Diane set up; I can also be timekeeper since I often have to do that myself. I'll ask another MN participant to come to our session & take notes. We'll keep video connection live so C can participate.
- Describe what you noticed. (D) 3 min
- What questions came up for you? (J) 2 min
- Speculate: What does Christopher want you to understand and be able to do? (J) 3 min
- Artist's Response (D) 3min Diane remind people that Christopher and Jessi "has the floor" so he can choose to respond to any questions that intrigue him, but doesn't have to answer questions; C can also just think aloud, let us hear his thoughts about the experience.

10 minutes - Questions & Feed-back (J)
- Thank you! (J, C & D)
Jessi transition from Artist's Response to thanking participants; invite questions & feedback.
At end, D & C briefly say thanks & goodbye along with Jessi.

D: let's add this to our handout page for NDEO distribution:

Agenda & Notes